Modern day embalming instruments and techniques are substantially the same as those used in the latter part of the 19th century with a few major changes pertaining primarily to the actual embalming process.
When an individual dies, the medical examination of the body is called an autopsy. In the process of an autopsy, the cavities of the body are opened for the examination by a medical examiner to determine the exact cause of death. The types of autopsies or examinations are: spinal autopsy, thorasic and abdominal autopsy and cranial autopsy. The medical purposes for the autopsy examination are: to determine the cause of death, to determine the manner of death, to determine factors contributing to death, to continue clinical study of death, and to investigate problems of physical an automical conditions that are caused by death.
Each of these types of autopsies require incisions which ultimately must be closed by sutures. In addition to autopsied incisions, there are other types of body openings that must be closed with sutures. These openings include gun shot wounds, stabbing wounds, lacerations, punctures, and various others too numerous to mention.
All body openings are presently closed by hand suturing methods and such methods are slow and include certain risk factors.
Probably one of the most hazardous procedures in the embalming process is the suturing of the cadaver. There is always the danger of the person performing the suturing operation being pricked with an infectious needle. There are highly infectious bacteria present in cadavers and the slightest scratch or prick with a suturing needle can cause serious illness, including hepatitis.
The time involved to close a fully posted thorasic, abdominal and crainial autopsied cadaver by hand suturing is generally over 11/2 hours. Accordingly, in the interest of safety of the person performing a suturing operation on a cadaver and the saving of time, the development of a motorized blind suturing apparatus for cadavers represents a considerable advance. Still further, hand suturing necessarily results in unevenness in the tightness of successive stitches or sutures and the chance for leakage and seepage is greater than desired.
Examples of various forms of suturing devices, including some of the more general structural and operational features of the present invention are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,580,964, 2,601,564 and 2,988,028.